An Archery Story From Carl

I received an email from my friend, Carl who lives in Virginia. He is also a neighbor here in North Carolina. I asked for his permission to share this and he agreed.

David, I want to share an archery story.

My son Mike and I were going to hunt Thanksgiving morning in Suffolk (about 20 minutes from home). I called Mike at 4:30 A.M. to let him know I was on my way to meet him and he then told me he wasn’t able to go.

Carl here in NC

Someone had gone through his truck the evening before or early morning and stolen his bow. His bow which he loved (Diamond Marquis) #70 lb. left hand. QAD rest, HHR single pin, Alpine archery quiver and Gold tip arrows, wrist release – all gone. As you know the accessories actually cost as much as the bow. He was devastated.

We took his old #60 Parker, found an old rest, quickie quiver, and fixed sight; I had a few old arrows. He tied in a peep I had in my archery box. He tried it out about 6:30 in his back yard at 20 yards on Thanksgiving evening.

We hunted on Friday and he killed a doe with it. He doesn’t miss very often anyway. Crisis averted except he was still going to have to buy a new bow for his elk archery hunt to Colorado in August. Now back to the stolen bow.

Mike of course checked pawnshops etc. around the area and nothing showed up. In the meantime he posted on face book about what happened and he had an outpouring of offers from friends and strangers to lend or give him a bow if he needed it. In his word, he was humbled.

In the meantime I looked at craigslist time again just in case.

On January 2, l looked and to my surprise I saw a bow that looked like Mike’s. It was left handed – (we could tell by the picture,-not a lot of those around) and it was listed as- Diamond Bow by bowtech.

We reported it to the police, nothing happened; it was still listed a week later. I wrote an email to the police chief and within 24 hours the bow was recovered less the arrows and release.

The guy who had it lived less than a ½ mile away from Mike. He wasn’t very bright either. The police just did a search of his phone number, got his address (he also had a police record for theft). Went to his home and said we are here for the bow. Mike just had to identify it.

A happy ending, other than having to buy a new bowstring.

(A late addition from Carl “….. a kind string maker in Maryland is making a new string at no charge.”)